In his most recent NYT column last Thursday, David Brooks said this:
Today, Americans are disillusioned with the war in Iraq, and many around the world predict that an exhausted America will turn inward again. Some see a nation in permanent decline and an end to American hegemony. At Davos, some Europeans apparently envisioned a post-American world.
Forget about it. Americans are having a debate about how to proceed in Iraq, but we are not having a strategic debate about retracting American power and influence...
As Robert Kagan writes in his masterful book “Dangerous Nation,” America has never really been an isolationist or aloof nation. The United States has always exercised as much power as it could. It has always coupled that power with efforts to spread freedom. And Americans have always fought over how best to fulfill their mission as the vanguard of progress...
What’s happening today is just another chapter in that long expansionist story...
When you look further into the future, you see that the next president’s big efforts will not be about retrenchment, but about expansion. They’ll be about expanding the U.S. military, expanding the diplomatic corps, asking for more shared sacrifice, creating new interagency bureaus that will give America more nation-building capacity.
While you might have spit up your orange juice after reading "asking for more shared sacrifice", and while you might disagree with Brooks' reading of history, and while you might not share Brooks' reading of the American mind, he does point out something that, as Glenn Greenwald notes, is both "true and important" --
Look at the leaders emerging amid this crisis. The two major Republican presidential contenders are John McCain and Rudy Giuliani, the most aggressive internationalists in a party that used to have an isolationist wing.
The Democrats, meanwhile, campaigned for Congress in 2006 by promising to increase the size of the military. The presidential front-runner, Hillary Clinton, is the leader of the party’s hawkish wing and recently called for a surge of U.S. troops into Afghanistan. John Edwards, the most “leftward” major presidential contender, just delivered a bare-knuckled speech in which he castigated the Bush administration for not being tough enough with Iran. “To ensure that Iran never gets nuclear weapons, we need to keep all options on the table,” Edwards warned.
Meanwhile Greenwald's been reading the NYCity tabloids which reported and discussed a recent suck-up fest to the American Israeli Political Action Committee attended by Hilary! and John Edwards. And apparently, Hilary!'s idea of engaging in diplomacy with Iran before dropping the bombs didn't go over well.
Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton drew grumbles at a pro-Israel dinner in Times Square last night when she encouraged "engaging" with Iran before taking stronger action to keep it nuke-free. . .
Clinton's remarks at the Marriott Marquis were met with little applause, and after she left the stage, several people said they were put off by the presidential candidate. "This is the wrong crowd to do that with," said one person at the dinner, noting the pro-Israel crowd wanted to hear tougher rhetoric...
Heather Robinson, who attended the AIPAC event [sic] is angry over Hillary's suggestion that war with Iran may not be necessary: "But while Hillary’s rhetoric of 'engagement' may sound good, the community of anti-terror activists and Israel-supporters must realize that, at the most basic level, engaging with people who wish your destruction–and are actively working to achieve it–means strengthening a pernicious enemy."
Fabulous.
Of course the whole whoring after campaign dollars from the self-described "ATM for American politicians" that is NYC's Jewish and particularly AIPAC community is in inverse proportion to the views of large majorities of American Jews.
So, we're left with the most troubling of all questions in American politics today: how is it that Big Money continues to exercise a role disproportionate to its popular support?
If three-quarters of the Jewish community voted for John Kerry, and if there is money to be had from other donors, both small and large, one wonders why presidential candidates, especially Democratic ones that are supposed to care about public opinion, continue to prostitute themselves in front of audiences and on behalf of causes that are both demonstratably foolhardy as well as unpopular (or at least unsought by the American public)?
Meanwhile, although I hate to speak ill of other liberal bloggers, two popular netroots folks of our persuasion have joined the John Edwards campaign. Here is what Shakespeare's Sister, one of said netrooters, had to say about that:
As for The Big Question: Why Edwards? A lot of reasons, none of which I've been too shy about sharing as my personal support for him has increased over the last months, although you can read more in my first Edwards blog post here. I will, however, mention the three little words that ultimately got me: "I was wrong." That's how John Edwards started his Nov. 13 op-ed in the Washington Post, referring to his Iraq war vote. "I was wrong," he said, and more than that: "I take responsibility for that mistake. It has been hard to say these words because those who didn't make a mistake—the men and women of our armed forces and their families—have performed heroically and paid a dear price. … [A] key part of restoring America's moral leadership is acknowledging when we've made mistakes or been proven wrong—and showing that we have the creativity and guts to make it right." I don't need a president who never makes mistakes; those don't even exist. I need a president who's willing to admit them. Those have been in short order as of late, you may have noticed.
Quite some time ago, a staffer for another then-potential presidential candidate called me to pick my brain about what it would take to get my support. One of the things about which I was most adamant was that the candidate had to say, quite plainly, that s/he was wrong on Iraq. The staffer ran a couple of options by me: "What if s/he said this? What if s/he said that?" I said what I wanted to hear was "I was wrong."
John Edwards gave me what I wanted. And I believe he offers America what it needs.
So Shakes, as she is affectionately called, heard the magic words about one war and felt good enough to sign on. But what about Iran? And what about the broader question of, as David Brooks referred to it, the "strategic debate about [sic] American power and influence"?
Well, Shakes has responded, sort of --
Earlier today, Ezra interviewed him, with an evident objective of getting some clarification on that speech—and enough people had specifically referenced it here that I thought the follow-up warranted posting here, too, particularly since, as Ezra notes, "His position here is more thoughtful and nuanced than his comments at the Herzliya conference revealed." [emphasis mine--Bulworth]
Anyway, Hilary! and Edwards have already sucked up to the war lobby's next ingenius idea and as Glenn Greenwald sadly documents, one other potential contender, Wes Clark, has already been taken to the woodshed for his attempt to address the issue honestly and competently and has returned very much the worse for wear after his penance.
So as Greenwald asks, what's left for us, and what Democratic candidates, if any, are going to rebuff the siren's call of war with Iran, given all that's transpired and continues to transpire in Iraq?
Well, TPM tells us that James Fallows says forget challenging the surge in Congress and concentrate on denying the Administration any wiggle room for warring on Iran.
It would be nice if our presidential candidates would, after they've fallen all over themselves repenting of their Iraq-war vote, which is now a politically safe call to make, and demonstrate they've actually learned something over the past four years by calling bullshit ahead of time in the already emerging propaganda designed to lure us into bombing another Muslim country that hasn't attacked us or anyone else yet, and which is not a "clear and present danger" to the United States or our allies.
Saturday, February 03, 2007
Friday, February 02, 2007
Thursday, February 01, 2007
Tom Menino, Ed Markey, and Fox "News": Just Shut Up
We have another winner(s).
I'm still trying to get my head around what all the fuss was about in Boston over the "signs".
So these "suspicious packages" were actually "magnetic lights" placed in ten different cities on behalf of a cartoon company? (h/t Steve Gilliard)
And Edward Markey (among others) is being a dope.
...Massachusetts Representative Ed Markey placed the blame on Adult Swim. "Scaring an entire region, tying up the T and major roadways, and forcing first responders to spend 12 hours chasing down trinkets instead of terrorists is marketing run amok," Markey, a Democrat, said in a written statement. "It would be hard to dream up a more appalling publicity stunt." The problem with this is that it was the paranoia of the police department that created the crisis, not Aqua Teen's creators down at Williams Street in Atlanta.
Ed Markey, you are a suck-up to the "we have everything to fear including fear itself" crowd.
And once again, perhaps spurring on and spurred on by the budding, if rapidly extinguished "crisis" the freepers went wild.
As Pollack says,
1. Attorney General Martha Coakley needs to shut up and stop using the word "hoax." There was no hoax. Hoax implies Turner Networks and the ATHF people were trying to defraud or confuse people as to what they were doing. Hoax implies they were trying to make their signs look like bombs. They weren't. They made Lite-Brite signs of a cartoon character giving the finger.
2. It bears repeating again that Turner, and especially Berdovsky, did absolutely nothing illegal. The devices were not bombs. They did not look like bombs. They were all placed in public spaces and caused no obstruction to traffic or commerce. At most, Berdovsky is guilty of littering or illegal flyering.
3. The "devices" were placed in ten cities, and have been there for over two weeks. No other city managed to freak out and commit an entire platoon of police officers to scaring their own city claiming they might be bombs. No other mayor agreed to talk to Fox News with any statement beyond "no comment" when spending the day asking if this was a "terrorist dry run."
4. There is nothing, not a single thing, remotely suggesting that Turner or the guerilla marketing firm they hired intended to cause a public disturbance. Many have claimed the signs were "like saying 'fire' in a crowded theater." Wrong. This was like taping a picture of a fire to the wall of a theater and someone freaked out and called the fire department.
So, please, Tom Menino, Ed Markey, Shepherd Smith, Just Shut Up.
I'm still trying to get my head around what all the fuss was about in Boston over the "signs".
So these "suspicious packages" were actually "magnetic lights" placed in ten different cities on behalf of a cartoon company? (h/t Steve Gilliard)
And Edward Markey (among others) is being a dope.
...Massachusetts Representative Ed Markey placed the blame on Adult Swim. "Scaring an entire region, tying up the T and major roadways, and forcing first responders to spend 12 hours chasing down trinkets instead of terrorists is marketing run amok," Markey, a Democrat, said in a written statement. "It would be hard to dream up a more appalling publicity stunt." The problem with this is that it was the paranoia of the police department that created the crisis, not Aqua Teen's creators down at Williams Street in Atlanta.
Ed Markey, you are a suck-up to the "we have everything to fear including fear itself" crowd.
And once again, perhaps spurring on and spurred on by the budding, if rapidly extinguished "crisis" the freepers went wild.
As Pollack says,
1. Attorney General Martha Coakley needs to shut up and stop using the word "hoax." There was no hoax. Hoax implies Turner Networks and the ATHF people were trying to defraud or confuse people as to what they were doing. Hoax implies they were trying to make their signs look like bombs. They weren't. They made Lite-Brite signs of a cartoon character giving the finger.
2. It bears repeating again that Turner, and especially Berdovsky, did absolutely nothing illegal. The devices were not bombs. They did not look like bombs. They were all placed in public spaces and caused no obstruction to traffic or commerce. At most, Berdovsky is guilty of littering or illegal flyering.
3. The "devices" were placed in ten cities, and have been there for over two weeks. No other city managed to freak out and commit an entire platoon of police officers to scaring their own city claiming they might be bombs. No other mayor agreed to talk to Fox News with any statement beyond "no comment" when spending the day asking if this was a "terrorist dry run."
4. There is nothing, not a single thing, remotely suggesting that Turner or the guerilla marketing firm they hired intended to cause a public disturbance. Many have claimed the signs were "like saying 'fire' in a crowded theater." Wrong. This was like taping a picture of a fire to the wall of a theater and someone freaked out and called the fire department.
So, please, Tom Menino, Ed Markey, Shepherd Smith, Just Shut Up.
Wednesday, January 31, 2007
"Conservativism Wasn't Rejected; It Was Betrayed"
Maybe by now you've heard how Jeb! brought a recent GOP gathering cheering to its feet by declaring--
"Don't take offense personally if I get mad at Congress," the Republican former Florida governor began. "It's important for us to realize we lost, and there are significant reasons that happened, but it isn't because conservatives were rejected. But it's because we rejected the conservative philosophy in this country."
He added, “If the promise of pork and more programs is the way Republicans think they’ll regain the majority, then they’ve got a problem.”
Bush's speech prompted three standing ovations from the audience of hundreds at the National Review Institute's conference at the JW Marriott Hotel, reflecting the widespread concern among conservatives that exorbitant government spending led to the loss of majorities in the House and Senate and concern about whether Republicans would again embrace the traditional principles.
If so, you might want to read Glenn Greenwald's response to this claim, as well as to the claim recently put forward by Andrew Sullivan amounting more or less to the same.
When he was popular, George Bush was the Embodiment of Conservatism. Now that he is rejected on a historic scale, he is the Betrayer of Conservatism. That is because "Conservatism" -- while definable on a theoretical plane -- has come to have no practical meaning in this country other than a quest for ever-expanding government power for its own sake. When George Bush enabled those ends, he was The Great Conservative. Now that he impedes them, he is the Judas of the Conservative Movement. It is just that simple and transparent.
(snip)
All of the attributes which have made the Bush presidency so disastrous are not in conflict with political conservatism as it exists in reality. Those attributes -- vast expansions of federal power to implement moralistic agendas and to perpetuate political power, along with authoritarian faith in the Leader -- are not violations of "conservative principles." Those have become the defining attributes of the Conservative Movement in this country.
That is why the warnings from Sullivan and others that the Republican Party was acting in violation of "conservative principles" fell on deaf ears and even prompted such hostility -- until, that is, Bush's popularity collapsed. "Conservative principles" are marketing props used by the Conservative Movement to achieve political power, not actual beliefs. Sullivan's principal argument that the Bush presidency never adhered to conservative principles is true enough, but the same can be said of the entire American conservative political movement. That is why they bred and elevated George Bush for six years, and suddenly "realized" that he was "not a conservative" only once political expediency required it.
But now, from the files of "when you're at the bottom of a hole, stop digging" comes this set of "principles" from the geniuses at RedState.org (h/t LG&M):
In an age when so much of what is called conservatism seems to consist of a tenacious defense of the structures of thought which have ushered in our decline — when, in short, conservatives make their boldest efforts to conserve the Liberalism that paralyzes us — there is just cause in adopting the label “reactionary.”
(snip)
Below is A Reactionary’s Shorter Catechism, hammered out by myself and long-time Redstate reader Maximos, with input from many others. It is offered in the spirit of More’s further remarks: “If any young man, feeling now within himself the power of accomplishment, hesitates to be called a reactionary . . . let him take courage. The world is not contradicted with impunity, and he who sets himself against the world’s belief will have need of all a man’s endurance and all a man’s strength.” Herewith, we contradict the world:
[selections--ed]
¶ A healthy polity will have a majority population and culture; contemporary orthodoxy on diversity tends towards anarchy and strife.
¶ The right of a community to maintain its identity, autonomy, and independence is among the first principles of a free polity.[...]
¶ Tradition and custom need not constantly explain or justify themselves as practice or policy. The presumption is in their favor. To drag them before the bar of a rigid rationalism is profound impiety.
¶ Men, and societies of men, are ultimately more apt to maintain loyalties among those who are like them. This is natural and not to be either deplored or extirpated, but rather disciplined by civic virtue.[...]
¶ Indiscriminate blending of cultures is thus undesirable, and more often than not an at least implicit act of aggression against the existing majority culture.[...]
¶ Voting is not a right but a privilege. Its abuse is rampant, and to contain it is a valid object of public policy. More damaging to a republic than corrupt politicians are corrupt voters.[...]
¶ The American traditions of federalism, states’ rights, and localism deserve the deepest respect and cultivation: for in them is the truest protection of liberty.
The folks at RedState miss the good-ole-days of Segregation.
More of this please. Maybe Sean Hannity will include this in his latest cable teevee act.
"Don't take offense personally if I get mad at Congress," the Republican former Florida governor began. "It's important for us to realize we lost, and there are significant reasons that happened, but it isn't because conservatives were rejected. But it's because we rejected the conservative philosophy in this country."
He added, “If the promise of pork and more programs is the way Republicans think they’ll regain the majority, then they’ve got a problem.”
Bush's speech prompted three standing ovations from the audience of hundreds at the National Review Institute's conference at the JW Marriott Hotel, reflecting the widespread concern among conservatives that exorbitant government spending led to the loss of majorities in the House and Senate and concern about whether Republicans would again embrace the traditional principles.
If so, you might want to read Glenn Greenwald's response to this claim, as well as to the claim recently put forward by Andrew Sullivan amounting more or less to the same.
When he was popular, George Bush was the Embodiment of Conservatism. Now that he is rejected on a historic scale, he is the Betrayer of Conservatism. That is because "Conservatism" -- while definable on a theoretical plane -- has come to have no practical meaning in this country other than a quest for ever-expanding government power for its own sake. When George Bush enabled those ends, he was The Great Conservative. Now that he impedes them, he is the Judas of the Conservative Movement. It is just that simple and transparent.
(snip)
All of the attributes which have made the Bush presidency so disastrous are not in conflict with political conservatism as it exists in reality. Those attributes -- vast expansions of federal power to implement moralistic agendas and to perpetuate political power, along with authoritarian faith in the Leader -- are not violations of "conservative principles." Those have become the defining attributes of the Conservative Movement in this country.
That is why the warnings from Sullivan and others that the Republican Party was acting in violation of "conservative principles" fell on deaf ears and even prompted such hostility -- until, that is, Bush's popularity collapsed. "Conservative principles" are marketing props used by the Conservative Movement to achieve political power, not actual beliefs. Sullivan's principal argument that the Bush presidency never adhered to conservative principles is true enough, but the same can be said of the entire American conservative political movement. That is why they bred and elevated George Bush for six years, and suddenly "realized" that he was "not a conservative" only once political expediency required it.
But now, from the files of "when you're at the bottom of a hole, stop digging" comes this set of "principles" from the geniuses at RedState.org (h/t LG&M):
In an age when so much of what is called conservatism seems to consist of a tenacious defense of the structures of thought which have ushered in our decline — when, in short, conservatives make their boldest efforts to conserve the Liberalism that paralyzes us — there is just cause in adopting the label “reactionary.”
(snip)
Below is A Reactionary’s Shorter Catechism, hammered out by myself and long-time Redstate reader Maximos, with input from many others. It is offered in the spirit of More’s further remarks: “If any young man, feeling now within himself the power of accomplishment, hesitates to be called a reactionary . . . let him take courage. The world is not contradicted with impunity, and he who sets himself against the world’s belief will have need of all a man’s endurance and all a man’s strength.” Herewith, we contradict the world:
[selections--ed]
¶ A healthy polity will have a majority population and culture; contemporary orthodoxy on diversity tends towards anarchy and strife.
¶ The right of a community to maintain its identity, autonomy, and independence is among the first principles of a free polity.[...]
¶ Tradition and custom need not constantly explain or justify themselves as practice or policy. The presumption is in their favor. To drag them before the bar of a rigid rationalism is profound impiety.
¶ Men, and societies of men, are ultimately more apt to maintain loyalties among those who are like them. This is natural and not to be either deplored or extirpated, but rather disciplined by civic virtue.[...]
¶ Indiscriminate blending of cultures is thus undesirable, and more often than not an at least implicit act of aggression against the existing majority culture.[...]
¶ Voting is not a right but a privilege. Its abuse is rampant, and to contain it is a valid object of public policy. More damaging to a republic than corrupt politicians are corrupt voters.[...]
¶ The American traditions of federalism, states’ rights, and localism deserve the deepest respect and cultivation: for in them is the truest protection of liberty.
The folks at RedState miss the good-ole-days of Segregation.
More of this please. Maybe Sean Hannity will include this in his latest cable teevee act.
Thursday, January 25, 2007
Sullivan on Faith
I think Andrew Sullivan puts it quite well here, in his response to Sam Harris.
My response rests on an understanding of truth that is not exhausted by empiricism or materialism. I do not believe, in short, that all truth rests on scientific premises and can be 'proven' by empirical or scientific methods. I believe science is one, important, valuable and respectable mode of thinking about the whole. But there are truth questions it has not answered and cannot answer. What I found insightful about your book was your openness to this possibility. You repeat that openness in your recent posting:
"While I spend a fair amount of time thinking about the brain (as I am finishing my doctorate in neuroscience), I do not think that the utter reducibility of consciousness to matter has been established. It may be that the very concepts of mind and matter are fundamentally misleading us."
So you allow for a space where the logic of science and of materialism does not lead us toward truth, but may even mislead us about it, and lead us away from it. This is a big concession, and it undermines the certainty of your entire case. Such an argument must rest on a notion of ultimate truth that is deeper than science, beyond science. It must rest on a notion that allows for the rational legitimacy of my faith.
It might even include an appreciation of other modes of rational discourse that are not empirical in origin or form. Take, for example, the question of historical truth. You rely in your books on a lot of historical facts to buttress your empirical case. But these facts are not true - and could never be proven true - by the scientific method that is your benchmark. There are no control groups in history. There are no experiments. But there is a form of truth. Discovering that historical truth is the vocation of a historian - and it is a different truth than science, and reached by a different methodology and logic.
Similarly, mathematics can achieve a proof that has no interaction with the physical world. It may even be the closest to divine truth that human beings can achieve. But it is still logically separate from empirically verified truth, from historical truth, and even from the realm of human consciousness that includes aesthetic truth, the truths we find in contemplation of art or of nature.
(snip)
But that is not the sum of your argument. You argue further that even if you concede the possibility of a legitimate form of religious truth-seeking, the content of various, competing revelations renders them dangerous. They are dangerous because they logically contradict each other. And since their claims are the most profound that we can imagine, human beings will often be compelled to fight for them. For if these profound matters are not worth fighting for, what is?
I agree that this is a central problem for religion in the world. It has always been so. it will always be so. This is not a new problem. It is arguably the oldest human debate. Whether one reads Pascal or Spinoza, Locke or Montaigne, Hobbes or Leo Strauss, the religious question always prompts a political question. I think the problem is eased - if never fully solved - by a critical move that I unpack in my book, "The Conservative Soul." That move is rooted in skepticism.
(snip)
In my book, excerpted in Time Magazine here, I put it this way:
If God really is God, then God must, by definition, surpass our human understanding. Not entirely. We have Scripture; we have reason; we have religious authority; we have our own spiritual experiences of the divine. But there is still something we will never grasp, something we can never know - because God is beyond our human categories. And if God is beyond our categories, then God cannot be captured for certain. We cannot know with the kind of surety that allows us to proclaim truth with a capital T. There will always be something that eludes us. If there weren't, it would not be God.
I don't think you're far away from this. That's why you've gone on retreats, explored Buddhism, experimented with psyclocybin, as I have. You see: we are closer than you might think. But you differ with me on how this translates into life. You ask legitimately: how can I, convinced of this truth, resist imposing it on others? The answer is: humility and doubt. I may believe these things, but I am aware that others may not; and I respect their own existential decision to believe something else. I respect their decision because I respect my own, and realize it is indescribable to those who have not directly experienced it. That's why I am such a dogged defender of pluralism and secularism - because I believe secularism alone does justice to the profundity of the claims of religion. The attempt to force or even rig laws to encourage others to share my faith defeats the point of my faith - which is that it is both freely chosen and definitionally dealing with matters that cannot be subject to common consensus.
My response rests on an understanding of truth that is not exhausted by empiricism or materialism. I do not believe, in short, that all truth rests on scientific premises and can be 'proven' by empirical or scientific methods. I believe science is one, important, valuable and respectable mode of thinking about the whole. But there are truth questions it has not answered and cannot answer. What I found insightful about your book was your openness to this possibility. You repeat that openness in your recent posting:
"While I spend a fair amount of time thinking about the brain (as I am finishing my doctorate in neuroscience), I do not think that the utter reducibility of consciousness to matter has been established. It may be that the very concepts of mind and matter are fundamentally misleading us."
So you allow for a space where the logic of science and of materialism does not lead us toward truth, but may even mislead us about it, and lead us away from it. This is a big concession, and it undermines the certainty of your entire case. Such an argument must rest on a notion of ultimate truth that is deeper than science, beyond science. It must rest on a notion that allows for the rational legitimacy of my faith.
It might even include an appreciation of other modes of rational discourse that are not empirical in origin or form. Take, for example, the question of historical truth. You rely in your books on a lot of historical facts to buttress your empirical case. But these facts are not true - and could never be proven true - by the scientific method that is your benchmark. There are no control groups in history. There are no experiments. But there is a form of truth. Discovering that historical truth is the vocation of a historian - and it is a different truth than science, and reached by a different methodology and logic.
Similarly, mathematics can achieve a proof that has no interaction with the physical world. It may even be the closest to divine truth that human beings can achieve. But it is still logically separate from empirically verified truth, from historical truth, and even from the realm of human consciousness that includes aesthetic truth, the truths we find in contemplation of art or of nature.
(snip)
But that is not the sum of your argument. You argue further that even if you concede the possibility of a legitimate form of religious truth-seeking, the content of various, competing revelations renders them dangerous. They are dangerous because they logically contradict each other. And since their claims are the most profound that we can imagine, human beings will often be compelled to fight for them. For if these profound matters are not worth fighting for, what is?
I agree that this is a central problem for religion in the world. It has always been so. it will always be so. This is not a new problem. It is arguably the oldest human debate. Whether one reads Pascal or Spinoza, Locke or Montaigne, Hobbes or Leo Strauss, the religious question always prompts a political question. I think the problem is eased - if never fully solved - by a critical move that I unpack in my book, "The Conservative Soul." That move is rooted in skepticism.
(snip)
In my book, excerpted in Time Magazine here, I put it this way:
If God really is God, then God must, by definition, surpass our human understanding. Not entirely. We have Scripture; we have reason; we have religious authority; we have our own spiritual experiences of the divine. But there is still something we will never grasp, something we can never know - because God is beyond our human categories. And if God is beyond our categories, then God cannot be captured for certain. We cannot know with the kind of surety that allows us to proclaim truth with a capital T. There will always be something that eludes us. If there weren't, it would not be God.
I don't think you're far away from this. That's why you've gone on retreats, explored Buddhism, experimented with psyclocybin, as I have. You see: we are closer than you might think. But you differ with me on how this translates into life. You ask legitimately: how can I, convinced of this truth, resist imposing it on others? The answer is: humility and doubt. I may believe these things, but I am aware that others may not; and I respect their own existential decision to believe something else. I respect their decision because I respect my own, and realize it is indescribable to those who have not directly experienced it. That's why I am such a dogged defender of pluralism and secularism - because I believe secularism alone does justice to the profundity of the claims of religion. The attempt to force or even rig laws to encourage others to share my faith defeats the point of my faith - which is that it is both freely chosen and definitionally dealing with matters that cannot be subject to common consensus.
On Autonomy
Lawyers, Guns and Money flags this quote from Paul at Powerline:
My Hill experience gave me a startling insight: Liberals and conservatives seemed to have mirror-image approaches to paternalism. Liberals made intrusive laws for the competent while conservatives preferred to rely on individuals to make their own decisions. Conversely, conservatives preferred intrusive laws for the incompetnet [sic] to whom liberals applied a hands-off policy. Liberals were comfortable with public health paternalism: intrusive nonsmoking laws, taxes on unhealthy products, strict risk-averse EPA and FDA regulations. . . . Yet, when a person was incoherent, defecating in the streets, or freezing a limb off in the part [sic], than [sic] -- and only then -- did the principles of autonomy apply.
If Paul is right, what explains the need by conservatives to regulate teh gay and abortion?
Are teh gay and women incoherent or incompetent?
My Hill experience gave me a startling insight: Liberals and conservatives seemed to have mirror-image approaches to paternalism. Liberals made intrusive laws for the competent while conservatives preferred to rely on individuals to make their own decisions. Conversely, conservatives preferred intrusive laws for the incompetnet [sic] to whom liberals applied a hands-off policy. Liberals were comfortable with public health paternalism: intrusive nonsmoking laws, taxes on unhealthy products, strict risk-averse EPA and FDA regulations. . . . Yet, when a person was incoherent, defecating in the streets, or freezing a limb off in the part [sic], than [sic] -- and only then -- did the principles of autonomy apply.
If Paul is right, what explains the need by conservatives to regulate teh gay and abortion?
Are teh gay and women incoherent or incompetent?
Robert Novak is such a Chucklehead
Conservative columnist Robert Novak:
When President Bush called for a bipartisan "special advisory council" of congressional leaders on the war against terrorism in his State of the Union address, he had in his pocket a rude rejection from Democratic leaders. Thank you very much, said House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, but no thank you.
Three days earlier, Reid and Pelosi wrote a letter to the president turning down his offer (which was contained in his Jan. 10 speech on Iraq) to establish a council consisting of Democratic chairmen and ranking Republican members of the relevant committees. "We believe that Congress already has bipartisan structures in place," they said, adding: "We look forward to working with you within existing structures."
(snip)
Courtesy aside, it shows that the self-confident Democratic leadership is uninterested in being cut into potentially disastrous outcomes in Iraq. It wants to function as a coordinate branch of government, not as friendly colleagues in the spirit of bipartisanship. Pelosi and several Democratic committee chairmen are leaving for Iraq on Friday.
In his Jan. 10 speech, Bush called for a "new, bipartisan working group that will help us come together across party lines to win the war on terror." That prompted the Pelosi-Reid letter of Jan. 19 rejecting the offer.
Bush made a mistake in attributing the idea to Connecticut Sen. Joe Lieberman, who as the Senate's only self-identified Independent Democrat is estranged from his colleagues who are unmodified Democrats. These former comrades are not charmed by the prospect of Lieberman pontificating as a member of the "working group" by virtue of his chairmanship of the Senate Homeland Security Committee.
But Lieberman was not the reason for the speaker and majority leader's rebuff. The Democratic leadership is beyond consultation on Iraq, as demonstrated by the selection of Sen. Jim Webb to deliver the party's response to the president Tuesday night. Webb, whose unexpected election in Virginia last year gave Democrats a Senate majority, is a hard-edged critic of the war not interested in bipartisanship. Discarding staff-written talking points, professional writer Webb declared: "The president took us into this war recklessly."
If there's one thing that's been made perfectly clear in the past six years it is that the Administration has no regard for Congress--even when it was run by its own party. Congress was not invited to "consult" in the lead up to the war, and wasn't invited to consult in the last two months, when the escalation "plan" was cooked up.
So, thanks for the invitation on January 10 after the decision to escalate the war was already made, to appear in a war "council" but no thanks.
When President Bush called for a bipartisan "special advisory council" of congressional leaders on the war against terrorism in his State of the Union address, he had in his pocket a rude rejection from Democratic leaders. Thank you very much, said House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, but no thank you.
Three days earlier, Reid and Pelosi wrote a letter to the president turning down his offer (which was contained in his Jan. 10 speech on Iraq) to establish a council consisting of Democratic chairmen and ranking Republican members of the relevant committees. "We believe that Congress already has bipartisan structures in place," they said, adding: "We look forward to working with you within existing structures."
(snip)
Courtesy aside, it shows that the self-confident Democratic leadership is uninterested in being cut into potentially disastrous outcomes in Iraq. It wants to function as a coordinate branch of government, not as friendly colleagues in the spirit of bipartisanship. Pelosi and several Democratic committee chairmen are leaving for Iraq on Friday.
In his Jan. 10 speech, Bush called for a "new, bipartisan working group that will help us come together across party lines to win the war on terror." That prompted the Pelosi-Reid letter of Jan. 19 rejecting the offer.
Bush made a mistake in attributing the idea to Connecticut Sen. Joe Lieberman, who as the Senate's only self-identified Independent Democrat is estranged from his colleagues who are unmodified Democrats. These former comrades are not charmed by the prospect of Lieberman pontificating as a member of the "working group" by virtue of his chairmanship of the Senate Homeland Security Committee.
But Lieberman was not the reason for the speaker and majority leader's rebuff. The Democratic leadership is beyond consultation on Iraq, as demonstrated by the selection of Sen. Jim Webb to deliver the party's response to the president Tuesday night. Webb, whose unexpected election in Virginia last year gave Democrats a Senate majority, is a hard-edged critic of the war not interested in bipartisanship. Discarding staff-written talking points, professional writer Webb declared: "The president took us into this war recklessly."
If there's one thing that's been made perfectly clear in the past six years it is that the Administration has no regard for Congress--even when it was run by its own party. Congress was not invited to "consult" in the lead up to the war, and wasn't invited to consult in the last two months, when the escalation "plan" was cooked up.
So, thanks for the invitation on January 10 after the decision to escalate the war was already made, to appear in a war "council" but no thanks.
Wednesday, January 24, 2007
Big Business Republicans Demand More Appeasement
What Ezra says:
PRIORITIES. In a display of savage corporatism, Senate Republicans are filibustering the minimum wage increase until Democrats lard the bill with tax cuts for businesses. Over the last six years, of course, businesses have gotten, literally, hundreds of billions in tax breaks. Congress hasn't raised the minimum wage in a decade.
Of course, there are 21 GOP Senate seats up the next time around.
Chris Bowers says:
Republicans continuing to suck up to business interests like this is going to give Democrats a big trifecta in 2008. Just look at the list of Republicans up for election in 2008 who voted against a clean minimum wage bill: Cornyn, Dole,. Domenici, McCain, Smith and Sununu. I don't care how red your state is--voting against the minimum wage isn't popular anywhere. The only place it is popular is among business interests who will be donating to the election campaigns of these Republicans. Even in defeat, Republicans treat government as basically a way to reward the key figures of their election machinery.
This bill will pass eventually. There is no way Republicans can hold out on this one indefinitely, considering how popular it is. Democrats need to keep pushing this as long and hard as possible until five more Republicans are forced to cave, even if that means the bill won't pass until 2009.
PRIORITIES. In a display of savage corporatism, Senate Republicans are filibustering the minimum wage increase until Democrats lard the bill with tax cuts for businesses. Over the last six years, of course, businesses have gotten, literally, hundreds of billions in tax breaks. Congress hasn't raised the minimum wage in a decade.
Of course, there are 21 GOP Senate seats up the next time around.
Chris Bowers says:
Republicans continuing to suck up to business interests like this is going to give Democrats a big trifecta in 2008. Just look at the list of Republicans up for election in 2008 who voted against a clean minimum wage bill: Cornyn, Dole,. Domenici, McCain, Smith and Sununu. I don't care how red your state is--voting against the minimum wage isn't popular anywhere. The only place it is popular is among business interests who will be donating to the election campaigns of these Republicans. Even in defeat, Republicans treat government as basically a way to reward the key figures of their election machinery.
This bill will pass eventually. There is no way Republicans can hold out on this one indefinitely, considering how popular it is. Democrats need to keep pushing this as long and hard as possible until five more Republicans are forced to cave, even if that means the bill won't pass until 2009.
The Messenger
"In the early days of our republic, President Andrew Jackson established an important principle of American-style democracy - that we should measure the health of our society not at its apex, but at its base. Not with the numbers that come out of Wall Street, but with the living conditions that exist on Main Street. We must recapture that spirit today.
And under the leadership of the new Democratic Congress, we are on our way to doing so. The House just passed a minimum wage increase, the first in ten years, and the Senate will soon follow. We've introduced a broad legislative package designed to regain the trust of the American people. We've established a tone of cooperation and consensus that extends beyond party lines. We're working to get the right things done, for the right people and for the right reasons."
Damn, Andrew Jackson and the minimum wage. In just two paragraphs.
See Democrats, it isn't that hard.
More of this, please.
Tuesday, January 23, 2007
Longer Bill Kristol/Joe Lieberman
It's true we've been wrong about everything related to Iraq, but the new plan to escalate the war means you should nevertheless shut up until we know whether it will succeed or not, which we probably won't know for another six to nine months. After we know whether it succeeds or not, you can offer your negative resolutions and criticize it. If it does fail, though, which we know it won't, we'll offer another new "plan" after which we'll again expect you to shut up, as is your duty in a Constitutional democracy and as is only fitting since everything related to this war has worked out so swimmingly.
Monday, January 22, 2007
The Best Thing About This Year's NFL Playoffs
After the first weekend, we were spared any more features, quotes, soundbites, photos and rumors about this man.
Uh oh. May have spoken too soon. Parcells retires himself again, after four years in Big D. How the new coach will handle this man soon to be main story.
Uh oh. May have spoken too soon. Parcells retires himself again, after four years in Big D. How the new coach will handle this man soon to be main story.
Just Shut Up award winner
I'm announcing the formation of an explor--check that, I'm announcing the inauguration of the first ever weekly, daily, annually, whatever, Just Shut Up award, to the politician, media personality, or institution that so qualifies.
And today I am handing out the very firstest Just Shut Up award to (envelope please)--
CNN, for it's repetitive, gratuitously self-serving promo about the auctioning off of it's Iraq hummer for charity.
CNN, come on down.
And Just Shut Up already.
I mean, 100+ plus more people have died in Iraq today. Do we need your hummer auction on the headline bar and all over the teevee like it was this weekend?
And today I am handing out the very firstest Just Shut Up award to (envelope please)--
CNN, for it's repetitive, gratuitously self-serving promo about the auctioning off of it's Iraq hummer for charity.
CNN, come on down.
And Just Shut Up already.
I mean, 100+ plus more people have died in Iraq today. Do we need your hummer auction on the headline bar and all over the teevee like it was this weekend?
Da Colts
I didn't even make it to the end of the first half of last night's Pat-Colts game. It was already 14-3 and I couldn't "bear" to watch anymore of it. I knew how it would end. By the time I clicked off the Internets last night and retired to bed for some good reading, it was 21-6.
I didn't find out the Colts stormed back for the win in the NFL's answer to Oklahoma-Boise State until this morning.
Well. Obviously a big "getting the monkey off his back" win for Peyton. But it was a big win for someone else, too: Tony Dungy. Dungy, you'll remember, put together several winning, playoff-competing seasons in Tampa, only to get canned when the owners tired of not winning the "big one", which they promptly did the very next year when they landed Jon Gruden from Oakland and beat the Raiders in the next year's Super Bowl. But Dungy landed on his feet quickly enough by taking over for Jim Mora senior in Indy. And in Indy, as in Tampa, Dungy had Da Colts winning and in the playoffs on a regular basis. But the big playoff win, especially when the game involved Bill Belichek's Pats, eluded him in the Hoosier state, too. Then after last year's monumental regular season, the Colts lost a heartbreaker--at home--to the future Super Bowl winning Steelers. Compounding the professional disappointment for Dungy was a far more serious human tragedy, as Dungy's son committed suicide in December 2005.
And even though Dungy, through Peyton, went on the conquer the Patriots during the regular season last year and this year (both in Foxboro), as well as go into Denver and beat the Broncos when that team was riding high, the Colts seemed thoughout much of their games this year to just be squeaking by, a sense that was amplified when they were routed by Dallas on Thanksgiving Day and later run over by the Jaguars.
In many ways, this Colts team is similar to Da Bears team they'll be facing. Both teams carry the label of underdog to a certain effect. Both had strong regular seasons in terms of wins and losses, but both were dogged by perceptions of softness on defense (Chicago's mostly due to injury depletions), under-achievement more generally, and overshadowed by more exciting teams in their conferences; for the Colts, there were the Ravens and Chargers; for the Bears, there were the resurgent Eagles and the Saints. And both teams present a two-headed running back tandem: the Colts with Joseph Addai and Dominic Rhodes; the Bears have Thomas Jones and the second-year man, Cedric Benson. And while Peyton Manning overshadows Rex Grossman, both team's QB's struggled this year with doubts as to their being able to come through when their teams needed them the most.
I like the Colts chances here, but not by much. I think the Bears will again need a big day from Rex Grossman and need to do what they did against the Saints--create turnovers. The challenge for the Colts on defense will be to again slow down their opponent's running attack. With their first two opponents, the Colts faced all-star running backs in Larry Johnson and Jamal Lewis. But for the Chiefs and Ravens, their running-back attack was largely centered on one man. The Pats presented a more rigorous challenge in some ways than either the Chiefs or Ravens in that they could come with both Corey Dillon and Mahoney. That will be a good test for what they will face with the Bears.
Both the Colts and Bears faced friendly environments Sunday. Both were at home. And especially for the Bears, and I know I'll get some hate-mail for this, they benefitted from the snow and slop on Soldier Field. Despite their running attack, the Saints like to pass the ball and the weather and field made that difficult. And that failure played into the hands of the Bears, defense-centered, turnover needing, run-first mentality.
I don't think the Bears will have the same privileges in Miami. We can guess there won't be any snow. But it won't be a dome either, something Peyton usually thrives in.
This is a hard game to predict, but here goes--
Colts 30, Bears 21
It'll be a close game throughout but the Colts will tack on a score at the end to put the game out of reach and make it appear less competitive that what it was.
I didn't find out the Colts stormed back for the win in the NFL's answer to Oklahoma-Boise State until this morning.
Well. Obviously a big "getting the monkey off his back" win for Peyton. But it was a big win for someone else, too: Tony Dungy. Dungy, you'll remember, put together several winning, playoff-competing seasons in Tampa, only to get canned when the owners tired of not winning the "big one", which they promptly did the very next year when they landed Jon Gruden from Oakland and beat the Raiders in the next year's Super Bowl. But Dungy landed on his feet quickly enough by taking over for Jim Mora senior in Indy. And in Indy, as in Tampa, Dungy had Da Colts winning and in the playoffs on a regular basis. But the big playoff win, especially when the game involved Bill Belichek's Pats, eluded him in the Hoosier state, too. Then after last year's monumental regular season, the Colts lost a heartbreaker--at home--to the future Super Bowl winning Steelers. Compounding the professional disappointment for Dungy was a far more serious human tragedy, as Dungy's son committed suicide in December 2005.
And even though Dungy, through Peyton, went on the conquer the Patriots during the regular season last year and this year (both in Foxboro), as well as go into Denver and beat the Broncos when that team was riding high, the Colts seemed thoughout much of their games this year to just be squeaking by, a sense that was amplified when they were routed by Dallas on Thanksgiving Day and later run over by the Jaguars.
In many ways, this Colts team is similar to Da Bears team they'll be facing. Both teams carry the label of underdog to a certain effect. Both had strong regular seasons in terms of wins and losses, but both were dogged by perceptions of softness on defense (Chicago's mostly due to injury depletions), under-achievement more generally, and overshadowed by more exciting teams in their conferences; for the Colts, there were the Ravens and Chargers; for the Bears, there were the resurgent Eagles and the Saints. And both teams present a two-headed running back tandem: the Colts with Joseph Addai and Dominic Rhodes; the Bears have Thomas Jones and the second-year man, Cedric Benson. And while Peyton Manning overshadows Rex Grossman, both team's QB's struggled this year with doubts as to their being able to come through when their teams needed them the most.
I like the Colts chances here, but not by much. I think the Bears will again need a big day from Rex Grossman and need to do what they did against the Saints--create turnovers. The challenge for the Colts on defense will be to again slow down their opponent's running attack. With their first two opponents, the Colts faced all-star running backs in Larry Johnson and Jamal Lewis. But for the Chiefs and Ravens, their running-back attack was largely centered on one man. The Pats presented a more rigorous challenge in some ways than either the Chiefs or Ravens in that they could come with both Corey Dillon and Mahoney. That will be a good test for what they will face with the Bears.
Both the Colts and Bears faced friendly environments Sunday. Both were at home. And especially for the Bears, and I know I'll get some hate-mail for this, they benefitted from the snow and slop on Soldier Field. Despite their running attack, the Saints like to pass the ball and the weather and field made that difficult. And that failure played into the hands of the Bears, defense-centered, turnover needing, run-first mentality.
I don't think the Bears will have the same privileges in Miami. We can guess there won't be any snow. But it won't be a dome either, something Peyton usually thrives in.
This is a hard game to predict, but here goes--
Colts 30, Bears 21
It'll be a close game throughout but the Colts will tack on a score at the end to put the game out of reach and make it appear less competitive that what it was.
Wednesday, January 17, 2007
Sam Harris, Andrew Sullivan Blogalogue
This should be interesting.
I imagine this will come up later, but allow me to state what I believe to be Sam Harris's point about, and problem with, religious moderates and religious moderation:
The great theistic religions: Judaism; Christianity; and Islam base their authority and legitimacy on sacred texts. And these texts do not convey any sense of religious moderation and in many cases, appear to flatly condemn it.
Furthermore, and consequently, religious moderation is essentially the process whereby a religious adherent dilutes his or her faith with the increases in knowledge and human sympathy garnered from two centuries of human and material experience, and not a posture born from a reading of the texts themselves.
As a sort of religious moderate, I have to concede that this argument is pretty valid. I've "coped" with this issue by assuming that the religious experiences I've had are valid, even if the sometimes literal intellectual assumptions I once made about the text are not. There tends to be a lot of all-or-nothing thinking in the worlds of religion and politics (maybe you've noticed). The religious moderate, or religious liberal, or post-modern Christian (we come in a variety of appearances and terminologies) basically rejects this paradigm completely. As such the Bible is one text among many that contribute to our spiritual experiences and sense of community. And like any other text, writer or institution, it is assumed to be, and in our experience does in fact demonstrate itself to be, a book that reflects many of the usual subjective human understandings, attitudes and wishes, which in turn require our careful examination.
It's not a perfectly rational answer. But life doesn't always lend itself to neat, rational answers. And in fact it rarely does.
In this vein, here are some religious sites you might find interesting.
An interview with the pastor of my church.
A post-modernish exploration of Christianity and other religious faiths.
A self-described progressive Christian blog.
I imagine this will come up later, but allow me to state what I believe to be Sam Harris's point about, and problem with, religious moderates and religious moderation:
The great theistic religions: Judaism; Christianity; and Islam base their authority and legitimacy on sacred texts. And these texts do not convey any sense of religious moderation and in many cases, appear to flatly condemn it.
Furthermore, and consequently, religious moderation is essentially the process whereby a religious adherent dilutes his or her faith with the increases in knowledge and human sympathy garnered from two centuries of human and material experience, and not a posture born from a reading of the texts themselves.
As a sort of religious moderate, I have to concede that this argument is pretty valid. I've "coped" with this issue by assuming that the religious experiences I've had are valid, even if the sometimes literal intellectual assumptions I once made about the text are not. There tends to be a lot of all-or-nothing thinking in the worlds of religion and politics (maybe you've noticed). The religious moderate, or religious liberal, or post-modern Christian (we come in a variety of appearances and terminologies) basically rejects this paradigm completely. As such the Bible is one text among many that contribute to our spiritual experiences and sense of community. And like any other text, writer or institution, it is assumed to be, and in our experience does in fact demonstrate itself to be, a book that reflects many of the usual subjective human understandings, attitudes and wishes, which in turn require our careful examination.
It's not a perfectly rational answer. But life doesn't always lend itself to neat, rational answers. And in fact it rarely does.
In this vein, here are some religious sites you might find interesting.
An interview with the pastor of my church.
A post-modernish exploration of Christianity and other religious faiths.
A self-described progressive Christian blog.
Media Propaganda and The Carnage of War
Judea Pearl, the mother of journalist Daniel Pearl, has an op-ed in today's NYT.
In it, Pearl warns of the dangers posed by the Arabic news-station, Al Jazeera, particularly its latest manifestation in English and carried over American satellite television.
She cites in particular the air-time provided to a Muslim cleric who has given religious sanction to suicide bombers and Islamic terrorist organizations and campaigns, the kind of which were responsible for the killing of her son in 2002.
Considering the depth of her loss, Pearl's column is a rather measured response to the threat she believes terrorist-sanctioning and celebrating media represents.
Still, she references a few anecdotes about Al Jazeera's coverage of the Middle East that I think are applicable to American cable television and are as such worthy of further discussion:
But what should concern Westerners is that the ideology of men like Sheik Qaradawi saturates many of the network’s programs, and is gaining wider acceptance among Muslim youths in the West. In its “straight” news coverage on its Arabic TV broadcasts and Web sites, Al Jazeera’s reports consistently amplify radical Islamist sentiments (although without endorsing violence explicitly).
For example, the phrase “war on terror” is invariably preceded by the contemptuous prefix “so-called.” The words “terror” and “insurgency” are rarely uttered with a straight face, usually replaced with “resistance” or “struggle.” The phrase “war in Iraq” is often replaced by “war on Iraq” or “war against Iraq.” A suicide bombing is called a “commando attack” or, occasionally, a “paradise operation.”
Al Jazeera’s Web site can be less subtle. On Dec. 12, after religious leaders and heads of state all over the world condemned President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran for staging a Holocaust denial conference in Tehran, the headline on the site read, “Ahmadinejad Praised by Participants of the Holocaust Conference in Tehran, but Condemned by Zionists in Europe.”
In short, Al Jazeera’s editors choreograph a worldview in which an irreconcilable struggle rages between an evil-meaning Western oppressor and its helpless, righteous Arab victims. Most worrisome, perhaps, it often reports on supposed Western conspiracies behind most Arab hardships or failings, thus fueling the sense of helplessness, humiliation and anger among Muslim youths and helping turn them into potential recruits for terrorist organizations.
While Pearl is probably right to point out the lack of "straight news" on Al Jazeera, let's take a trip back in time to the pre-Iraq invasion coverage by CNN, "The Most Trusted Name in News" (from Glenn Greenwald):
On January 26, 2003, Wolf Blitzer held a panel discussion on CNN to discuss [Scott] Ritter’s war opposition. Ritter was not present, but Peter Beinert, the pro-war Editor of The New Republic, and Jonah Goldberg, the pro-war pundit from National Review, were invited to urge the invasion of Iraq, mock Ritter’s anti-war arguments, and smear him with a series of personal attacks.
Neither of these young, great “experts” who were urging the country to war had any experience with the weapons inspection process or with Iraq. Joining them was Democratic strategist Donna Brazile and Robert George of The New York Post, both of whom also supported the war and whose level of expertise on these matters was equal to Beinert’s and Goldberg’s.
Blitzer began the segment on Ritter by describing him as “an outspoken critic of a possible war against Iraq [who] was arrested in 2001 for allegedly communicating over the internet with an undercover police officer who was posing as a 16 year old girl.” Blitzer's question for the panel: “Is Scott Ritter's credibility now destroyed?” Brazille’s answer: “Absolutely. It shows that he has poor judgment.”
George went next and accused Ritter of having been paid “hundreds of thousands of dollars from Saddam Hussein's regime,” so everyone could safely ignore anything Ritter said because he was an agent of Saddam – “a pro-Saddam guy,” in George’s words. George was referring to a documentary produced by Ritter that was financed by an American citizen of Iraqi descent and which contended, correctly as it turns out, that the U.N. inspection process had “defanged” Iraq’s weapons program.
But the fact that Ritter’s film was financed by an American business man of Iraqi origin – and, more to the point, that Ritter then became an outspoken opponent of the war -- was continuously used by war advocates to smear the former Marine as an agent of Saddam Hussien’s. Thus, with the smear on Ritter’s loyalty firmly in place, arguments by Ritter that there was no convincing evidence of Iraqi WMDs, and that Iraq could not pose a threat to the U.S., could be easily ignored.
Beinert followed George and immediately said:
Yes, I agree. I think that he didn't have any credibility to begin with. I mean, this is the guy who never really explained, as Jonah said, why he flipped 180 degrees and became a Saddam mouthpiece. So for me it's irrelevant. I never listened to what he had to say on Iraq to begin with.
Once the Great Iraqi expert, Peter Beinert, was done smearing Ritter’s credibility and making clear that he could be safely ignored on the issue of Iraqi WMDs, Goldberg uttered: “Yes, I agree with everybody,” and then added:
He's now just basically joined Pete Townsend on the Magic School Bus. . . . Pete Townsend of the WHO has also been implicated in child porn and things of that nature. But as everybody said, Ritter's credibility, just on the basics of Iraq, was completely shot and now there's even less reason to listen to him.
The brilliant work of this expert panel complete, Blitzer decreed: “Let's move on now.”
Pearl goes on to question Al Jazeera's attachment of the prefix "so-called" to the "war on terror", and the changing of "war in Iraq" to "war on Iraq", again as if American media is any less guilty for carefully manipulating the use of words and images to put foward a certain "choreographed" world view.
Pearl also worries that Al Jazeera transmits a Manichean, us-against-them, good-against-evil view of the world to its listeners.
Well, it's hard to imagine she keyed in those words without recognizing the irony of an American president who has framed the Iraq war, domestic surveilance programs, overseas detentions and torture strategies, and other questionable efforts in precisely those terms and an American media that has largely taken that craftsmanship to heart.
Finally, at the bottom of Pearl's concern is the media's role in the promotion of views that lead explicitly to the devaluing of human life. But again, when American leaders and American media promote wars (or "liberations") on, against, or in Middle Eastern lands, unconcerned with the loss of civilian life (justified or minimized by the us-against-them, good-versus-evil framing), it's hard to exactly demand that Al Jazeera and the people of those lands not resort to the form of violence that works to their advantage.
Pearl is aghast that terrorist promoting clerics are given air time by seemingly oblivious media managers. But as Glenn Greenwald discusses today, Americans' view of war has changed considerably in the last several decades. In short, because our wars have largely been high tech, low risk affairs, Americans have become largely sheltered from their brutality and destructiveness. And naturally, this is why suicide bombings are so offensive to the western mind, and why the us-against-them, good-against-evil meme continues to be used and play out on both sides of the world and everywhere in between.
In it, Pearl warns of the dangers posed by the Arabic news-station, Al Jazeera, particularly its latest manifestation in English and carried over American satellite television.
She cites in particular the air-time provided to a Muslim cleric who has given religious sanction to suicide bombers and Islamic terrorist organizations and campaigns, the kind of which were responsible for the killing of her son in 2002.
Considering the depth of her loss, Pearl's column is a rather measured response to the threat she believes terrorist-sanctioning and celebrating media represents.
Still, she references a few anecdotes about Al Jazeera's coverage of the Middle East that I think are applicable to American cable television and are as such worthy of further discussion:
But what should concern Westerners is that the ideology of men like Sheik Qaradawi saturates many of the network’s programs, and is gaining wider acceptance among Muslim youths in the West. In its “straight” news coverage on its Arabic TV broadcasts and Web sites, Al Jazeera’s reports consistently amplify radical Islamist sentiments (although without endorsing violence explicitly).
For example, the phrase “war on terror” is invariably preceded by the contemptuous prefix “so-called.” The words “terror” and “insurgency” are rarely uttered with a straight face, usually replaced with “resistance” or “struggle.” The phrase “war in Iraq” is often replaced by “war on Iraq” or “war against Iraq.” A suicide bombing is called a “commando attack” or, occasionally, a “paradise operation.”
Al Jazeera’s Web site can be less subtle. On Dec. 12, after religious leaders and heads of state all over the world condemned President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran for staging a Holocaust denial conference in Tehran, the headline on the site read, “Ahmadinejad Praised by Participants of the Holocaust Conference in Tehran, but Condemned by Zionists in Europe.”
In short, Al Jazeera’s editors choreograph a worldview in which an irreconcilable struggle rages between an evil-meaning Western oppressor and its helpless, righteous Arab victims. Most worrisome, perhaps, it often reports on supposed Western conspiracies behind most Arab hardships or failings, thus fueling the sense of helplessness, humiliation and anger among Muslim youths and helping turn them into potential recruits for terrorist organizations.
While Pearl is probably right to point out the lack of "straight news" on Al Jazeera, let's take a trip back in time to the pre-Iraq invasion coverage by CNN, "The Most Trusted Name in News" (from Glenn Greenwald):
On January 26, 2003, Wolf Blitzer held a panel discussion on CNN to discuss [Scott] Ritter’s war opposition. Ritter was not present, but Peter Beinert, the pro-war Editor of The New Republic, and Jonah Goldberg, the pro-war pundit from National Review, were invited to urge the invasion of Iraq, mock Ritter’s anti-war arguments, and smear him with a series of personal attacks.
Neither of these young, great “experts” who were urging the country to war had any experience with the weapons inspection process or with Iraq. Joining them was Democratic strategist Donna Brazile and Robert George of The New York Post, both of whom also supported the war and whose level of expertise on these matters was equal to Beinert’s and Goldberg’s.
Blitzer began the segment on Ritter by describing him as “an outspoken critic of a possible war against Iraq [who] was arrested in 2001 for allegedly communicating over the internet with an undercover police officer who was posing as a 16 year old girl.” Blitzer's question for the panel: “Is Scott Ritter's credibility now destroyed?” Brazille’s answer: “Absolutely. It shows that he has poor judgment.”
George went next and accused Ritter of having been paid “hundreds of thousands of dollars from Saddam Hussein's regime,” so everyone could safely ignore anything Ritter said because he was an agent of Saddam – “a pro-Saddam guy,” in George’s words. George was referring to a documentary produced by Ritter that was financed by an American citizen of Iraqi descent and which contended, correctly as it turns out, that the U.N. inspection process had “defanged” Iraq’s weapons program.
But the fact that Ritter’s film was financed by an American business man of Iraqi origin – and, more to the point, that Ritter then became an outspoken opponent of the war -- was continuously used by war advocates to smear the former Marine as an agent of Saddam Hussien’s. Thus, with the smear on Ritter’s loyalty firmly in place, arguments by Ritter that there was no convincing evidence of Iraqi WMDs, and that Iraq could not pose a threat to the U.S., could be easily ignored.
Beinert followed George and immediately said:
Yes, I agree. I think that he didn't have any credibility to begin with. I mean, this is the guy who never really explained, as Jonah said, why he flipped 180 degrees and became a Saddam mouthpiece. So for me it's irrelevant. I never listened to what he had to say on Iraq to begin with.
Once the Great Iraqi expert, Peter Beinert, was done smearing Ritter’s credibility and making clear that he could be safely ignored on the issue of Iraqi WMDs, Goldberg uttered: “Yes, I agree with everybody,” and then added:
He's now just basically joined Pete Townsend on the Magic School Bus. . . . Pete Townsend of the WHO has also been implicated in child porn and things of that nature. But as everybody said, Ritter's credibility, just on the basics of Iraq, was completely shot and now there's even less reason to listen to him.
The brilliant work of this expert panel complete, Blitzer decreed: “Let's move on now.”
Pearl goes on to question Al Jazeera's attachment of the prefix "so-called" to the "war on terror", and the changing of "war in Iraq" to "war on Iraq", again as if American media is any less guilty for carefully manipulating the use of words and images to put foward a certain "choreographed" world view.
Pearl also worries that Al Jazeera transmits a Manichean, us-against-them, good-against-evil view of the world to its listeners.
Well, it's hard to imagine she keyed in those words without recognizing the irony of an American president who has framed the Iraq war, domestic surveilance programs, overseas detentions and torture strategies, and other questionable efforts in precisely those terms and an American media that has largely taken that craftsmanship to heart.
Finally, at the bottom of Pearl's concern is the media's role in the promotion of views that lead explicitly to the devaluing of human life. But again, when American leaders and American media promote wars (or "liberations") on, against, or in Middle Eastern lands, unconcerned with the loss of civilian life (justified or minimized by the us-against-them, good-versus-evil framing), it's hard to exactly demand that Al Jazeera and the people of those lands not resort to the form of violence that works to their advantage.
Pearl is aghast that terrorist promoting clerics are given air time by seemingly oblivious media managers. But as Glenn Greenwald discusses today, Americans' view of war has changed considerably in the last several decades. In short, because our wars have largely been high tech, low risk affairs, Americans have become largely sheltered from their brutality and destructiveness. And naturally, this is why suicide bombings are so offensive to the western mind, and why the us-against-them, good-against-evil meme continues to be used and play out on both sides of the world and everywhere in between.
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